“Window there, behind that old blind. Go see what it’s like outside.”
“You go and look yourself.”
Mildred had the revolver cocked in her right hand. She didn’t have much doubt that she could probably manage to take out all three sec men.
If she had to.
If she wanted to.
Might be better to just pretend she was frightened and had gotten lost.
But she was becoming increasingly suspicious as to what she and the others had stumbled upon.
“All right, I’ll go look myself.” One of the men walked toward her.
“No, leave it, Eddie. See when we get back up there. Crichton was getting fired up. Better if we don’t keep him waiting any longer.”
If Mildred had stuck out her right hand, holding the ZKR 551, the barrel would have touched the white plastic jacket of the nearest sec guard.
He belched noisily, revealing that he had to have eaten some garlic-flavored mush for part of his most recent meal. “Yeah, sure. I just love the idea of goin’ out into this shittin’ weather in the dark.”
He turned and she could hear the sound of the three pairs of boots moving quickly down the corridor toward the institute’s central atrium.
Mildred wondered how Krysty was getting on at her interrogation, considering if she ought to start making her own way back to the living quarters. The news about some of the hunters being lost was bad. But she tried to blank any worry about J.B. from her mind.
Behind her she could see that it was still snowing. There was a catch on the window and Mildred tried to open it, wondering whether she might escape from the trap by going around the outside of the institute. But the metal was fragile and the lock snapped in her hand, leaving the window a little ajar. A freezing wind blew a few flakes of white in around her feet, melting as soon as they touched the floor.
She eased herself from behind the blind, wincing as it rattled back into place. A careful look around the corner of the passage showed it to be completely deserted. When Mildred glanced the other way, the sight of the bolted iron door was too tempting to ignore.
Moving quickly and quietly, she passed the table where the two guards had been playing cards. For a few moments she stood quite still, listening, hearing nothing. It was as though she had been locked into an underground tomb, away from all sight and sound.
Mildred turned and looked at the pale green door. Then she placed her hand on the cold metal of the closed grille, slid it open and looked through.
There was a short passage that appeared to end in a blank wall, with half a dozen green painted doors on either side. By pressing her face to the metal, Mildred could see that they were all bolted on the outside. She was just able to hear the faintest murmur of conversation.
“Nothing ventured, nothing gained,” she whispered, quoting one of her father’s favorite sayings.
The large bolt moved easily. There was a keyhole for a security lock, but the door, unlocked, swung open.
The revolver steady in her right hand, she moved into the corridor.
KRYSTY WAS LYING on her bed when the bulk of the hunting party returned to the living quarters.
All of them looked cold and tired, melting ice dripping from faces, hair and clothes.
J.B. went straight to her room, dropping his blaster on the spare bed. “Ryan’s missing,” he said.
“I heard. And Trader.”
“Yeah. Blowing up a real blizzard out there.” He took off his fedora and shook water from its crown. “They went toward the east. Five sec men and the woman whitecoat.”
Krysty sat up as the others drifted in from their own rooms.
“How went your inquisition?” Doc asked. “I trust you resisted bravely.”
“I guess so. The first thing they”
J.B. interrupted her. “Wait a minute, Krysty. Where’s Mildred?”
“Went off on a recce on her own.”
“What?” The eyes behind the misted glasses were bright with anger.
“We were kept waiting a long while. We realized that the sec forces were seriously depleted with the hunt going on. She’s been double curious about what was going on in that locked-off part of the wing.”
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